Well, our stuff made it . . .

Our household goods arrived!  But as it’s been this entire journey, let’s just say it didn’t go off without a hitch.  On the bright side, all of the effort I put into preparing our customs documentation worked - we didn’t have to pay 23% VAT on our household goods!  On the other hand . . . well, join us to find out.

I wish I had a lot of photos of the movers in action but I don’t.  In grand Portuguese fashion, they sent two people to do a four person job.  And while the two of them (Nunu and Diogo) had to haul everything from the container and move it into the moving truck, they had a third person on the job moving everything into the house.  Yes, you guessed right - I am one sore puppy this morning.  But it’s all in here.

Of course, we did little more than move everything into the house.  It’s going to take some time to unpack everything.  I figure I’d start in the basement - as good a place as any.

We moved most of the boxes into the basement simply because we have the room for it and because we don’t quite know where the contents of each box will go.  The furniture, however, was moved to the rooms where we wanted them to be.  Well, let’s just say for the most part.  That means our couch is downstairs where it belongs.  I carried most of the boxes from the garage to the basement, so I managed to do a bit of sorting along the way.  The boxes on the left are things that will go into the Bimobil (formerly in Beast), as well as my tools.

I also managed to arrange boxes in a way where their contents can be read just in case we want to pick and choose what we want to go through.  As Nunu said, “You have a lot of boxes.”  His eyes widened when I told him that we’d cleaned out about half of our stuff as it was. 

Last weekend Ann and I spent a lot of time thinking about how our photography work area would be laid out.  For now that will have to go on the back burner because I suspect it will be a bit before I’m able to move into my office to work.

Speaking of my office there was, how does one put it . . .  complications.  First off, there is a giant bookshelf that is in my office that was supposed to go downstairs.  Simply put, we couldn’t get it past the turn in the stairwell (it took us two tries with the couch - it had to be oriented a particular way to make the turn).  There’s also an issue with my desk (Ann’s former desk).  You see, the movers took it all apart.  So while there is a functioning corner piece (see below), I don’t know where the wings are (well, I think I know where one of them is) or where the hardware is to connect everything.  I hope it’s in an obvious place.

But, here’s much of my office, all ready to be unpacked!

Ann was probably the smart one.  Actually, Diogo was the smart one.  He saw one box labeled “kitchen” and he asked me if I wanted it taken up there.  Ann started unpacking immediately (which I won’t complain about because that means she’ll be cooking sooner rather than later with “her” cookware).  Diogo subsequently brought every box labeled “kitchen” upstairs for Ann without asking.  Which Ann subsequently attacked with gusto.  My suspicion is that it was also a way for her not to fret about how the movers (including myself) were hauling things around.  Let’s just say that the marks on the walls are pretty good evidence that Ann was right to focus on the Kitchen boxes.

And, as you can see, she has a lot of organizing to do!  Of course after she washes everything.

The living/dining area has its own things we’ll have to deal with.  Much of the furniture has little nicks and repairs that will be necessary (I guess unavoidable given the journey it took).  Fortunately, the marble top and giant mirror survived the trip, despite the fact that they were supposed to be crated and were not.  

I suspect my weekend task will be to put the kitchen table back together again.  That will get this area looking pretty much normal I think.

And, as I mentioned, there were a few mishaps.  Yes, the media cabinet is supposed to have two doors (the other is sitting on the couch).  Fortunately, the door came loose on its removable latches, so it should be easy enough to get back on.  But the cabinet is extremely heavy (Nunu went down the street to a construction site and got two burly guys to help us haul it into the house) and needs to be leveled, so we’ll need to get someone in to do the necessary tweaks, just as was done when it was moved into the old home.  Fortunately, it fit under the stairs!

Ann’s office even has a few additions.  Like me, she’ll have a nice chair to sit in and read (or nap) as well as one of the stand up cabinets from my old office.  She’ll also have, like me, a lean-to bookshelf that, like her old office desk, was disassembled.  While I know where the shelf rails are, I haven’t a clue about the shelves themselves (old, recycled barn joists) or the requisite hardware.

There was even stuff for the guest bedroom.  Kind of sparse I know, but . . .

the bedframe with a bunch of other stuff (to include our woodblock prints) are all in the garage.  As I said, it’s going to be a long while before we’re totally unpacked and the house is fully presentable.  Perhaps it’s good that the virus is keeping guests away for the time being

In the end, there really wasn’t much left from our old home to go into our bedroom (that is, of course, if you don’t include the clothes sitting in boxes downstairs that will ultimately make it up here), but there were a couple of items - our tansu chest and cherry wardrobe.

After the movers had gone and we’d finally situated ourselves, I was exhausted, sore and definitely needed a shower.  But I must admit, when I turned around after getting clean clothes on and saw the above, I felt like I was . . . home.  That’s a really good feeling and probably the best reason for making all the effort we did to get everything here.

Now all we have to do is unpack all of this stuff!